The Relationship Between Engineering Education and Industry in the Netherlands

After a brief introduction the extension of engineering education in the Netherlands after World War II is described. A scheme of the national education system is given. Some attention is paid to post-academic education in engineering and to practical training in industry. Throughout the paper the question of funding is emphasised. The core of the paper is devoted to a new phenomenon at the Universities of Technology in the Netherlands, namely the ‘Transfer Points’ and the help given to new entrepreneurs. A plea is made for a better contact between the Higher Technical Schools and industry, to improve the training and understanding of students as well as staff in industry and for enhancing feedback of experience in industry to the curriculum planners for the future.     

Educators at Work in two Sectors of Adult and Vocational Education: an overview of two European Research projects

Adult learning staff play a key role in making lifelong learning a reality. It is they who facilitate learners to develop knowledge, skills and attributes. At the European level there is a lack of information about various aspects of the profession, such as who they are, how they are recruited, what their specific roles and tasks are, what competences and qualifications they are expected or required to possess, what their employment status is, how their professional development is organised, how they are assessed, and how attractive their profession is. This article is meant to bridge this gap and describes the variety of contexts in which adult learning staff are working. Furthermore, it seeks to reveal the factors that promote or affect the quality of the work provided by these practitioners and will address a number of issues that should be on the agenda of policy makers. This article is based on the outcomes of a study that have been carried out by an international research group in the period 2007 -2008, under guidance of Research voor Beleid and PLATO University Leiden under contract of the European Commission (DG Education and Culture).     

Journal article mining: the scholarly publishers' perspective

The essence of text mining and data mining is that a machine and software are used for content analysis of large digital corpora. The Publishing Research Consortium commissioned a study on content mining of scholarly journal articles with 29 expert interviews and an international survey among publishers. The main results are: (i) content mining developments appear to be accelerating with more applications in more areas; (ii) third‐party demand for content mining is widespread but still at low levels of frequency; (iii) publishers' permissions for content mining are quite liberal, especially for research‐driven mining requests; (iv) half of the publisher respondents undertake mining of their own content; and (v) content mining is on the rise – publishers and third parties both report an increase in planned mining activities. As content mining of journal articles spreads and intensifies, cross‐publisher solutions can better help facilitate content mining. The study investigated the interest and willingness of publishers to support a set of different solutions, from one shared content mining platform to commonly agreed access terms for mining and standardization of mining‐friendly content formats.     

The Risk and Potentiality of Engaging with Sustainability Problems in Education—A Pragmatist Teaching Approach

This article engages in the discussion about education's role in relation to sustainability problems, a debate characterised by a tension between two legitimate concerns: a concern about the instrumentalisation of education, and a concern for the urgent need of widespread engagement and mobilisation for coping with the consequences of severe socio-ecological problems. The authors argue for an approach that takes both concerns seriously. Drawing on transactional didactic theory—underpinned by a pragmatist perspective on the interplay of continuity and change through the phases of habit, crisis and creativity—they illustrate that engagement with real-world societal problems does not inevitably result in the instrumentalisation of education. It can, on the contrary, open up a space for newness, creativity, freedom and pluralism. Yet, realising this unique educative potential does not happen automatically. It requires specific didactical work, specific forms of teaching. Through a practical example, the authors illustrate how teachers can stage problematic situations and inquiries in such a way that sustainability problems are brought to the table, turned into a common matter of concern and made free by giving the students possibilities to renew the world. Thus, they turn the question whether or not to engage with real-world problems into the question how to do so.     

Use of the Collaborative Drawing Technique in School Counseling Practicum: An Illustration of Family Systems

According to the extant school consultation literature, counselors can effectively use brief family interventions and family assessment procedures in schools as part of a collaborative consultation approach. School counselors, however, often lack training in family systems theory, because counselor training programs tend to use individual counseling models. When used in a school counselor practicum course, the Collaborative Drawing Technique (CDT; G. M. Smith, 1985) introduces counselors‐in‐training to family systems concepts and lays the foundation for postgraduate training in family systems. The authors use a case illustration to explore paradigmatic shifts in trainees' case conceptualizations as a function of their use of the CDT with a family.